Pillar guides
The cornerstone playbooks. Start here if you're new to running an exterior painting business or rebuilding your go-to-market.
How to Market a Painting Business
The complete 2026 marketing playbook. Channels that work for residential exterior painters, channels that don't, and the math behind each.
How to Get Customers for a Painting Business
Customer acquisition strategy for residential exterior painters in year 1 through year 10. Step-by-step plan for the first 5 jobs.
Best Software for Painting Contractors
Feature comparison and software guide. What to look for, what to skip — across acquisition, estimating, and ops tools.
Exterior Painting Pricing Guide
Per-sq-ft pricing by prep level, regional variation, HOA premium, and target gross margins.
How to Start a Painting Business
The realistic launch playbook: licensing, equipment, spray vs brush, first-year financials, customer acquisition.
How to Scale a Painting Business
From solo to multi-crew: crew leaders, spring-surge capacity, interior division, HOA niches.
Software comparisons
Honest side-by-side reviews of the tools painting contractors actually consider.
Paint Launch vs Jobber
Generic home-services CRM vs painting-specific acquisition. When each fits in the spring booking cycle.
Paint Launch vs Housecall Pro
Multi-trade ops vs painting acquisition. What painters miss with Housecall Pro alone.
Paint Launch vs PaintScout
In-home estimating vs painting acquisition. The combined sales workflow.
Paint Launch vs Markate
Paint-friendly small-business CRM vs painting acquisition. The small-painter stack.
Channel comparisons
Which marketing channels work for residential exterior painting — and the spring-surge play.
Mailed Paint Quotes vs Facebook Ads
Why color preview makes mailed quotes win over Facebook for spring booking.
Mailed Paint Quotes vs Google Ads
Where bottom-of-funnel Google fits in a painter's mix.
Direct Mail vs Door-Knocking for Painting
Door-hangers as during-install follow-up; the highest-converting paint channel.
Why Facebook Ads Don't Work for Painting
The structural reasons cold Facebook breaks for exterior paint.
Use cases and features
How specific Paint Launch features fit into a residential exterior-painting acquisition workflow.
CRM for Painting Contractors
Rendered repaint images, color picker, wall-area math, HOA approval pipeline stage, seasonal calendar.
Postcards for Painting Contractors
The four-rule design with embedded color picker, $1/postcard math, mid-January through March window.
Neighborhood Targeting
5-filter framework: exterior age, median value, HOA color permissiveness, seasonal timing, home-style cohesion.
Lead Prospecting for Painting
Street-level prospecting with HOA detection vs Angi-style aggregator leads.
Neighbor Follow-Up Workflow
12-18 month exterior visibility; HOA pre-approved color compounding.
Instant Property Measurement
Body wall sq ft, trim linear feet, soffit, gable area on every render — no on-site tape measure.
Scheduler for Painting Contractors
Spring-surge capacity view, weather-hold tracking, HOA approval pipeline gate, color-locked bookings.
How Much to Spend on Painting Marketing
Budget benchmarks by revenue tier, the January-March mailing window, per-channel ROI table.
Paint Launch Affiliate Program
7% recurring on referrals for painting coaches, YouTubers, and paint-brand reps. Monthly Stripe payouts.
AEO question pages
Direct answers to the questions painting contractors ask most — pricing, margin, licensing, deposits, earnings, and seasonality.
How to Render a House in a New Color
30-second AI render with SW / BM / PPG / Behr color picker.
How to Price a Painting Job
Per-sq-ft body + trim, prep-tier multipliers, three-tier upsell.
What's the Margin on Painting?
35-50% gross; spring-surge capacity + three-tier mix are the levers.
How to Onboard a Painting Customer
Color-lock to walkthrough 8-stage flow; weather-flexible scheduling.
Do I Need a License for Painting?
State painting contractor + federal EPA RRP for pre-1978 homes.
How to Collect Paint Deposits
$100-$300 color-lock deposit; 30-50% material at contract.
How Much Can a Painting Contractor Make?
Solo path cap, multi-crew growth; seasonal capacity drives earnings.
Best Time of Year for Painting
January-March marketing, April-October install, product-temp tolerances.
Brand comparisons (paint manufacturer commercial accounts)
How Paint Launch acquisition stacks with paint-manufacturer commercial accounts. Both brand-agnostic across SW / BM / PPG / Behr on the customer portal.
Paint Launch vs Sherwin-Williams
SW commercial account + Paint Launch acquisition; company-store distribution.
Paint Launch vs Benjamin Moore
Premium-tier positioning with Aura; independent-dealer distribution.
Paint Launch vs PPG
Manor Hall + Timeless; regional strength in Northeast + Midwest.
Paint Launch vs Behr Pro
Home Depot-exclusive + accessible distribution; value-tier through Marquee premium.
Glossary
Definitions of the key painting terms — prep tiers, HOA approvals, application methods, commercial pricing, seasonality.
What are Paint Prep Levels?
Wash + paint, scrape + prime + paint, full prep + premium product tiers.
What is an HOA Approval Letter?
Formal architectural-committee submission with colors + visual; auto-generated by Paint Launch.
Spray vs Brush vs Roll
Production-tier spray + back-roll technique vs brush-only.
Sherwin-Williams Contractor Pricing
PaintPerks Pro tier-based commercial account discounts.
The Spring Booking Window
January-April Q1 mailing window for spring + summer install capacity.
More coming soon
Additional brand-program deep-dives and case studies are in the queue. Sign up free to get notified — and start your first paint campaign while you wait.
Start a 5-house paint render.
Type in a street name. Paint Launch generates an AI render of each house in your chosen new color (preserving brick, stone, and trim), and you can mail postcards at $1 each. First $1,000 campaign is money-back guaranteed.
Create my free account →